Playing with Fire ~ Kate Meader ~ NEW RELEASE

From popular romance author Kate Meader comes the second novel in Hot in Chicago, a brand-new, sizzling series that follows a group of firefighting foster siblings and their blazing hot love interests! As the only female firefighter at Engine Co. 6, Alexandra Dempsey gets it from all sides: the male coworkers who think she can’t do the job, the wives and girlfriends who see her as a threat to their firefighter men, and her overprotective foster brothers who want to shelter their baby sister at all costs. So when she single-handedly saves the life of Eli Cooper, Chicago’s devastatingly handsome mayor, she assumes the respect she’s longed for will finally come her way. But it seems Mr. Mayor has other ideas… Eli Cooper’s mayoral ratings are plummeting, his chances at reelection dead in the water. When a sexy, curvaceous firefighter gives him the kiss of life, she does more than bring him back to the land of the living—she also breathes vitality into his campaign. Riding the wave of their feel-good story might prop up Eli’s flagging political fortunes, but the sizzling attraction between them can go nowhere; he’s her boss, and there are rules that must be obeyed. But you know what they say about rules: they’re made to be broken…

Elizabeth's Review

4 stars

Review copy provided by publisher via Net Galley

Things continue to be Hot in Chicago for the Dempsey family of the Chicago Fire Department! After seeing how Alex Dempsey and Mayor Eli Cooper dealt with each other in Flirting With Fire (Book 1 of the series), I really wondered how Author Meader was going to get them together in this story.

The answer is an awesome combination of chemistry and sneaky. I initially didn’t like the lie Eli told Alex to get her to spend time with him, but after seeing them together for a while, I could forgive it. These two were adversarial with and attracted to each other from the day they met. Ms. Meader does a fantastic job of playing off both aspects to keep their interactions authentic to who their characters are.

We are also given great glimpses of who Eli and Alex are as individuals and some of the struggles they are dealing with, especially Alex as a female fire fighter. One of the things I enjoyed about this romance was the fact that we saw the couple together in normal “this is life” situations, so it was easy to root for them with the going got tough.

Playing with Fire is a continuation of the Hot in Chicago series, so we see characters from previous (and future) stories appear as supporting cast here. Having read earlier parts of the series would be helpful for background, but not necessary. Playing with Fire is a complete stand-alone work and Ms. Meader does a great job of providing enough background so that the roles of the secondary characters make sense without them overwhelming the story being told.

If you have any interest in a story with a strong female lead and a very alpha hero then this is definitely a book you want to pick up.

Where to find Playing With Fire

Amazon
Barnes and Nobel 
Goodreads